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Elizabeth Sandifer

Elizabeth Sandifer created Eruditorum Press. She’s not really sure why she did that, and she apologizes for the inconvenience. She currently writes Last War in Albion, a history of the magical war between Alan Moore and Grant Morrison. She used to write TARDIS Eruditorum, a history of Britain told through the lens of a ropey sci-fi series. She also wrote Neoreaction a Basilisk, writes comics these days, and has ADHD so will probably just randomly write some other shit sooner or later. Support Elizabeth on Patreon.

14 Comments

  1. Shining Blitz
    July 24, 2014 @ 3:28 am

    "And, I mean, the licensed Doctor Who comic was never going to be it."

    Why do you figure that? I'm not saying that Titan 11 #1 is high art, but why couldn't it have been? What precludes greatness from realizing itself in a licensed comic?

    I'm not busting chops or anything, I mean that sincerely.

    Reply

  2. Cameron Dixon
    July 24, 2014 @ 6:13 am

    And his explanation is this wonderful, small, "you seemed sad."

    Hmm. The explanation is indeed wonderful, but it might be bigger than you thin, given that:

    (i) The alien they're chasing is drawn to people's misery, and the Doctor explicitly states that it came up to Alice because she was unhappy. Yes, he's being nice about it, but… there's a possibility there that he went back to enlist her help — that he also went back to enlist her help — so he could use her as bait.

    (ii) This story seems to be set before thingy, but at one point, the Doctor sees a thingy, and the end implies that the thingy is going to be followed up on. This is the Doctor who went back for Amy because he was interested in the crack in her wall, and pretty much stalked Clara until she agreed to travel with him because he wanted to solve her mystery. Perhaps he's drawn a connection between Alice and the thingy.

    (iii) What you said. Even if he had other motivations for what he was doing, they neither contradict or diminish the fact that he sat down with Alice and gave her a sympathetic ear when she needed it.

    So yeah, perfect characterisation of Matt Smith's Doctor, but I think even more perfect than you had the time to go into here.

    Reply

  3. Matthew Blanchette
    July 24, 2014 @ 7:34 am

    I don't want to be rudely off-topic, but… whence cometh "Night Terrors"? 🙁

    Reply

  4. Elizabeth Sandifer
    July 24, 2014 @ 9:33 am

    When you would expect given when Night Terrors aired in relation to other episodes.

    Reply

  5. Elizabeth Sandifer
    July 24, 2014 @ 9:34 am

    Equally, I think the art is very much on the side of the small reason – the way the Doctor's face falls, as though Alice's sadness was tangibly painful to him, is really a thing of beauty.

    Reply

  6. Elizabeth Sandifer
    July 24, 2014 @ 9:35 am

    For the same reason that it's not going to come out of Original Sin 5.2 Thor & Loki: The Tenth Realm – because I think there's a real upper bound to how good you can be while filling in the negative space of someone else's story.

    Reply

  7. BerserkRL
    July 24, 2014 @ 10:40 am

    Ahem. "Whence" means "from where," not "when."

    Reply

  8. Brightcoat
    July 24, 2014 @ 10:50 am

    The way I see it, if any existing universe's "negative space" can support art, Doctor Who is that universe. Well, that and the real world.

    Reply

  9. Jesse
    July 24, 2014 @ 11:32 am

    this homage to the 70s Blaxploitation roots of Luke Cage that's also a huge meta-joke about the sliding Marvel timeline and how it means that Luke Cage wasn't actually around for his own era of history

    Reminds me of this.

    Reply

  10. Elizabeth Sandifer
    July 24, 2014 @ 11:55 am

    I used the phrase "negative space" consciously, though, to denote things that had actively been left open by other people. It's not just "fitting stories into the gaps," but fitting stories into deliberate, conscious gaps. Which can still be done well, but you start at a disadvantage, frankly.

    Reply

  11. You Know Who...
    July 24, 2014 @ 3:37 pm

    I agree with all that's been said about the 11th Doctor comic, which I really enjoyed…but why no mention of the 10th Doctor comic? I read it first, basically hated it, and was looking forward to this blog engaging with it. (It also improved the experience of reading the other one, because I was basically expecting nothing.)

    Oh, and as for Velvet, I get it digitally, and keep the previous issue on my phone to read before each new one. It helps a lot – – this comic is probably my favourite monthly floppy.

    Reply

  12. dirkmalcolm.com
    July 25, 2014 @ 7:26 am

    Yeah, you mean wherefore cometh Night Terrors

    Reply

  13. Matthew Blanchette
    July 25, 2014 @ 8:10 am

    No, because "wherefore" means "why"; hence, "wherefore art thou Romeo?" means "why are you Romeo?". Simple as that.

    Reply

  14. Triturus
    July 25, 2014 @ 4:04 pm

    This comment has been removed by the author.

    Reply

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